


Stuck Holding Hands

by PerrythePlatypusGirl



Series: Sheith Anthology [6]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Crack Played Straight, Getting Together, M/M, Mutual Pining, oh no their hands are stuck together whatever shall we do, the team is Very Helpful, this is very silly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-12
Updated: 2018-12-19
Packaged: 2019-09-17 05:41:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,559
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16968723
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PerrythePlatypusGirl/pseuds/PerrythePlatypusGirl
Summary: After a mission goes awry, Shiro and Keith wake up to realize that their hands are stuck together. Now they have to deal with it until the team finds a solution. Of course, it's not that simple where you're stuck to the best friend you've had a crush on for years.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So I guess this takes place somewhere during season 2? It's a bit canon divergent in that sense but eh, this is a fanfic, who needs canon anyway.

It was supposed to just be a quick errand.

Coran asked them to retrieve...something, they couldn't remember what—from a place called Temiton Cove. Shiro had stepped on something glowing and gotten stuck. Keith had pushed him out of the way of a sudden blast of light. That's all they could remember. After that, they found themselves waking up on the hard ground of the cave, to the voices of their teammates yelling in their ears.

Shiro groaned and rubbed his head. The annoying ringing in his ears subsided, and he could hear Allura yelling at them.

_"Shiro! Keith! Do you copy??"_

Shiro looked over at Keith lying next to him, also starting to stir awake.

"We're here, Allura," Shiro replied weakly.

Allura sighed audibly with relief. _"Oh, thank goodness. What happened? You didn't respond for over a varga, we got worried."_

"Sorry," said Shiro, watching as Keith rubbed his head with one hand and gripped Shiro's hand with the other. "Something knocked us out for some reason, but we're okay. We'll be back at the castle in a minute."

With that, Shiro focused his attention on Keith. "You okay, buddy?"

Keith groaned, but nodded. "What happened?"

"I'm not sure. We were out for an hour for some reason. Everyone's waiting for us at the castle, let's get out of here."

Keith nodded and let Shiro pull him up with their already-joined hands. Once he was on his feet, Keith tried to let go of Shiro's hand, only to find that Shiro was holding on tight.

Keith flushed a little and cleared his throat. "Uh, Shiro, you can let go now."

Shiro frowned. "I am letting go. You're the one who's holding on."

"What? No I'm not." He tried to pull away again. So did Shiro. But to their dismay and horror, they found that they couldn't move their fingers. Even when Keith tried to physically pry their hands apart, they wouldn't budge.

"Are we—are we _stuck?"_

Shiro shook his head in disbelief. "No way, h-how could we be stuck? Did you grab some kind of adhesive?"

"No! I went out at the same time as you!" He grunted and tried in vain to shake their hands loose. "It must have something to do with that glowy thing we saw."

Shiro blew out a breath and kept a cool head, as usual. "Okay, okay. Let's just get back to the castle and we'll figure it out."

"How are we supposed to fly our lions with our hands stuck together?"

"We'll just have to leave one here and get it later. Come on."  
—-  
A few minutes later, they walked hand in hand onto the bridge, where Allura was waiting with Lance.

Lance was on them the second they appeared. "There you are! What the heck happened? We were all running out of the cave and you two just vanished!"

Keith grit his teeth at the sound of Lance's voice. "We just got held back for a little while, that's all."

"Held back by wha—oh. _Ooooh."_ Lance's expression slowly shifted into a sly grin as he sing-songed. "So that's what you guys were busy doing this whole time."

Shiro frowned. "What?"

"You know, if you guys just wanted to be alone, you could have told us," Lance continued. "We would have given you space."

Keith's face immediately started burning when he realized that Lance was just seeing them holding hands with no explanation. Allura had clearly seen it too, considering how wide her eyes were.

Shiro and Keith both started stammering over each other. "Wh—no, we're not—there was a light—we were unconscious—." They stopped abruptly, looking at each other, then away.

Lance and Allura just looked confused.

Shiro covered his face with his free hand and tried to hide his mortification. "Look—we'll explain all this later. Right now we just need to go get Keith's lion, it's still on the planet's surface."

"What?" Allura asked. "Why would you leave it down there?"

"We had to fly back in one lion, because as you can see—." Shiro held up their joined hands to demonstrate. "—we are stuck."

Allura and Lance stared, taking a second to understand what was going on.

"Wait," said Lance. "Your...hands are stuck together?"

"Yes, Lance," sighed Keith.

"So—you're _not_ romantically involved?" asked Allura.

"No," they both replied.

Allura looked disappointed, but didn't press further. "Well, alright. We'll go retrieve the lion, then we can see if we can figure something out."

As soon as she was done speaking, a door opened and the rest of the team walked in.

"Whoa, you guys are back!" Hunk cried as soon as he saw Keith and Shiro. "We were looking for y—wait, are you holding hands??"

Pidge looked up from what she was holding and smirked. "About time."

Keith and Shiro groaned.  
—-  
Once they managed to get all the lions back in the castle, the team gathered around Keith and Shiro while they tiredly explained what happened for the third time.

"So, you just woke up holding hands, and now you can't let go?" Pidge asked.

"That's right," said Shiro.

Coran was studying their conjoined hands meticulously. "Well, it doesn't look like anything's changed about your hands, physically," he observed. "They're just clasped together real tight. Let me see if I can—," he tried to pull their hands apart, grunting and straining comedically with effort. But it was no use.

"Oh, you're really stuck together," Coran pointed out helpfully. "I've never seen anything like it."

"Oh, I think I saw a movie like this once!" Hunk said suddenly. "It's like, you gotta learn to work together and get along so you'd get unstuck."

"You dummy, they work together and get along better than any of us!" Lance countered.

"Well, it's the only idea I've got, okay?"

Pidge had taken Coran's place in poking and prodding at their hands. "We could always just...chop your hands off."

"Pidge!" Keith snapped. Shiro had already lost one hand, he wouldn't be losing another on Keith's watch.

Pidge shrugged. "What? It was just a suggestion."

"Okay," Allura started. "I think we're all just tired from the mission. We should get some rest before we figure out what to do. Shiro, Keith, is that okay with you?"

They both nodded. "Maybe it'll just...wear off by morning," Shiro murmured.

Everyone gave a tired sigh and started to file out of the room. Shiro and Keith were last. They started to sleepily walk to their own rooms when they suddenly remembered...they couldn't.

The implications of what would have to happen flooded into Keith's mind. He hoped Shiro couldn't hear how fast his heart was pounding.

Shiro licked his lips. "Alright. So. Uhh, we need to change out of this armor, and go to sleep so we can be well rested for tomorrow."

Keith turned redder. "Can't we just...sleep in our armor?"

"Come on, Keith, we're adults. It's no different than changing in the Garrison locker rooms, okay?"

Sure, except the only reason Keith could think of for people to stand so close to each other when taking their clothes off is if they were about to—

"Let's just get this done quickly so we can get it overwith," Shiro said quickly. He pulled Keith along into his room as the younger one tried to calm himself down.

They managed to get the chestplates off with some effort, but the undersuits were a different story.

"Hold still," Shiro grumbled.

"I can't, I need both my hands."

"So do I--ok, fine. You go first. I'll wait."

Keith had to push away the image of Shiro watching him undress (he wasn't, Shiro was looking the other way like a decent human being), and tried to work as quickly as possible.

He got it off his shoulders and down his chest quickly enough. Then Shiro's hand brushed against his abs. Shiro flinched and instinctively pulled his arm a way, and of course Keith went right along with him.

Next thing they knew they were chest to chest, Keith half-naked. Shiro's face was was about the same shade as a tomato.

"You know what?" Shiro croaked. "We could just sleep in our undersuits."

Keith swallowed. "Y-yeah."  
\---  
They'd been too tired and frazzled by the changing fiasco to even dwell on the thought of sharing a bed. In the morning they awoke after a restless sleep. Keith immediately looked at their hands.

"...still stuck."

Shiro replied with a deep sigh.

Thankfully the rest of their morning tasks were easy and completely non-awkward to get through. They headed to the kitchen and made breakfast, and ate together at the table in generally comfortable silence.

That is, until Pidge, sitting across the table from them with a fascinated look on her face, decided to open her mouth. "How come you guys are in your armor already?"

Keith nervously swallowed his food and let Shiro answer.

"We, uh, couldn't change last night," Shiro said, somehow keeping his voice even despite the memory. He held up their hands to show her why. "We're just going to have to live like that until we get unstuck."

Lance nearly choked on his food. "Wait, so--you're not going to get out of those outfits at all?? Not even to shower??"

Keith hadn't even thought about _showering._

"No way, you guys could be stuck like that for months, for all we know!" Lance continued. "You'll start cultivating-- _space bacteria_ on your bodies if you keep the same clothes for that long! Or heck, what if you guys just need to use the bathroom? What will you do then?"

"Allura said we'd figure out a solution _today,"_ Keith snapped. "So shut up, Lance."

"I-I said we'd try," Allura clarified, but Keith had already made up just mind.   
\---  
Except, they didn't find a solution that day. Or the next. Or the next.

Shiro and Keith had managed to suck it up and just deal with changing and using the bathroom while the other person looked away. It was awkward, but they soon got used to it--and Keith could very much get used to the whole sharing-a-bed thing.

There was just one problem: they were still stuck together.

"Are you guys sure you didn't see anything at Temiton Cove when we went back to check?" Shiro asked for what felt like the billionth time.

"Shiro, you and Keith were right there with us," Pidge replied. "It just looked like a normal cave, nothing out of the ordinary."

"Maybe we could find some natives and ask them about it?" Hunk suggested. "I bet they'd know something about a mysterious cave that makes people get stuck together."

Coran laughed. "Good luck with that, Hunk. The natives have shut themselves off from the rest of the world for years, they never speak to outsiders. I do remember some of their language however. Temiton means _emotion,_ and Cove means...well, cove."

Pidge blinked. "Emotion Cove? Why would they call it that?"

Coran shrugged. "The people down there named it that way for a special reason," he said. "That's what I've heard, anyway."

"Well, I didn't see any special reasons," Keith growled. "All I saw was a bunch of stupid normal rocks that don't answer anything about this--this stupid spell, or whatever the hell it is!"

"Take it easy, Keith," Shiro said softly. "There's got to be some way to fix this. I'm sure we'll find it eventually."

Keith just grumbled to himself, and everyone else sighed in defeat.

"I think we just need to blow off some steam," Shiro continued, mostly talking to Keith. "Keith, you wanna go fight some gladiator bots?"

Keith just shrugged. "Sure."

They excused themselves from their friends and walked down to the training room. Of course they only had one arm each and had to stay together, but they'd be able to manage.

The bot came down, charging fast. Keith had his bayard and Shiro had his arm (because thankfully his robot arm wasn't the one that was stuck), and they moved as one, taking down the bot easily.

They did this a few more times, moving together with ease, until both of them were panting and staring down at the remains of the defeated bots.

"We work pretty well together," Shiro said.

"Yeah, we do," Keith agreed. He wiped the sweat off his forehead and grunted. "That's why I don't get why this is happening. If the problem is teamwork, like Hunk said, then we shouldn't have a problem at all."

Shiro frowned. "Yeah."

"It's not that I don't like being around you," Keith continued. "But this--it's ridiculous."

"I know, Keith. But we've been working at this for so long, we've got to find an answer soon."

"What if we don't? What if we're stuck like this forever?"

Shiro hesitated for a second, but shook his head. "No, let's not think like that. We've been through worse. We'll figure it out."

Keith sighed. He loved Shiro, but he'd never understand that constant optimism of his. Tiredly, he leaned forward until his head was resting on Shiro's chestplate, and his friend responded with a laugh and a pat on the shoulder.

"Guess the exercise helped," Shiro said. "We should hit the showers."

"You mean our awkward showers where one of us stands right outside the door and stares at the ceiling the whole time?"

Shiro snorted. "Yes. What other choice to we have?"

Keith let himself turn pink since Shiro couldn't see him. They'd already done it a few times but it still got his traitorous heart racing. He'd never sneak a peek at Shiro without permission of course, and he'd rather punch himself in the face than humiliate himself by asking, but still...the idea was hard to just get out of his head.

"Alright. Let's go."  
\---


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For your post-s8 depression needs...told you we didn't need canon.

It was yet another several days later that Lance suddenly bolted upright with a bright smile on his face. "Ooh! I got it! Epiphany!"

Everyone looked up. "What are you talking about, Lance?" asked Pidge.

Lance stood up proudly. "I've figured out Keith and Shiro's situation. Remember when Hunk talked about teamwork?"

"Yes," Keith said, annoyed. "And we already established that wasn't the problem."

"Yeah, exactly!" Lance continued. "And that got me thinking, the name of the cave where you got stuck—it's not called Teamwork Cove, it's called Emotion Cove!"

"Where are you going with this, Lance?" Allura asked.

"I'm saying that the problem isn't about working together, it's got more to do with feelings."

Keith hoped nobody saw him flinch.

Pidge started laughing. "Feelings? What? How does that even work?"

"Do they need emotional counseling or something?" Hunk added with a snort.

"Maybe they do," Lance replied, waving off their laughter. "Maybe one of them is mad about something, maybe they've got secret romantic feelings, I dunno—stop laughing, I'm the only one who's got anything close to an answer!"

"That—that's a decent theory, Lance, but it doesn't have any weight to it," Shiro said. "Keith and I—we don't have anything to confess."

"Y-yeah," Keith agreed. "We tell each other everything already. And Shiro can read me like an open book."

Lance stood up and examined both of them closely. "Tell each other everything? Do you really, though? Do you really?"

Pidge and Hunk suddenly stopped laughing.

"Actually, now that I think about it," Pidge said, adjusting her glasses. "Maybe Lance is onto something."

Lance grinned. "Thank you, Pidge."

Keith's face felt like it was burning off, and he immediately stood up to push Lance away. "He's not onto anything!" he snapped. "There's no _feelings_ to talk about!"

Keith stomped off, dragging Shiro with him, who was trying to calm him down.

Once they were out of the room, Lance sat back down and leaned in his seat. "Well, _he's_ definitely got some emotional stuff to deal with."  
—-  
"Lance is probably wrong," Shiro assured him.

"Of course, Lance is always wrong," Keith grumbled.

"Then what made you so upset?"

"I-I don't know. He just annoys me."

Shiro chuckled fondly. "Yeah. I've noticed." He bumped Keith's shoulder with his own. "You wanna just get ready for bed?"

"Sure..."

Keith's mind continued racing until he was lying on his back next to Shiro. This had been their arrangement ever since they got stuck, and Keith thought he'd managed to quell the butterflies in his stomach after the first few times sharing a bed, but it seemed that that wasn't the case anymore.

Lance was wrong. Of course he was wrong. Why would this problem be solved by a love confession of all things? It was ridiculous.

But Keith would be lying if he said he didn't panic at the idea of having to tell Shiro how he really felt. That he'd realized he loved him as more than a brother-figure a while ago. There was no chance in hell Keith would ever actually tell Shiro about that. It would ruin the friendship they'd had for years. Not to mention, if Lance's theory was as off the mark as it sounded, Keith would end up stuck to the person who rejected him for who knows how long, and that would make everything worse.

No. It wasn't happening. Nothing good would ever come out of telling Shiro how he felt. He was fine where he was now. He wouldn't get anything more, and he'd accepted that already.   
—-  
But the seed had been planted, and Keith couldn't forget.

Days later, they were on a patrol mission—being stuck together didn't mean that they could just abandon the war—Shiro and Keith both piloting the Black Lion with their free hands. The others were chattering over the comms.

"Allura, one of the prime ministers down here says he wants to speak with you," Hunk said from his spot on the ground. "Something about opening up supply routes."

"Tell him I'll be there in a few vargas," Allura replied. "Everyone else, is everything looking clear out there?"

"Coast is clear for me, Princess," said Lance. "Not a Galra in sight."

"I'm good too," replied Pidge.

"Shiro?"

Shiro suddenly seemed to snap out of a daze. "Oh, yeah. I'm not picking up anything."

Allura seemed satisfied and moved on.

Keith snapped out of his own thoughts and turned to Shiro, who was staring up at him with an illegible expression.

"You seem distracted," Keith said.

Shiro grinned. "Actually I was just thinking about how you seem distracted. You okay?"

Keith frowned and turned away. "I'm fine."

Shiro was quiet again, but thankfully he dropped it. After a minute he spoke again. "So how does piloting Black feel?"

Keith rolled his eyes. "This again, Shiro? It feels fine, but I prefer Red."

Shiro chuckled. "Fair enough. I will admit I prefer piloting with you than trying to make you replace me."

Keith smiled to himself.

"Though I do feel bad that you have to stand up the whole time."

Keith snorted. "You're not going to make me sit on your lap or something, are you?"

Shiro flushed and gave an embarrassed laugh. "N-no, I think we've already crossed enough personal boundaries. Uh, but you do look kind of uncomfortable. Here, switch places with me."

Shiro stood and made way for Keith to sit. Keith obliged—but not before he heard the high pitched giggles and snorts of their teammates over the comms.

"Jesus Christ," Pidge finally said, and this made Lance burst out laughing.

"I was okay until he said _'switch with me,'_ " Hunk added.

Keith could feel himself turning red yet again and he didn't dare look up at Shiro. "Wh—why are you guys listening to us?!"

"You're the ones flirting over the main line!" Hunk shouted back.

"We're not flirting, he was offering me his seat!"

_"Ooooh~"_ Lance cooed.

Keith would have yelled at them some more, but Shiro squeezed his hand and Allura called them all back to the castle. That was the end of that.

Flirting. What led them to _that_ conclusion?? It's just like when they'd seen Shiro and Keith holding hands the first time and thought they were a couple. No, that they were "finally" a couple. How exactly had they found out about Keith's crush? He thought he'd kept that a closely guarded secret. Regardless, they'd have to cut that teasing out if they didn't want Keith punching their teeth out. God, they're embarrassing.

Once they were back at the castle, Shiro busied himself talking with Allura and Coran. Keith took the opportunity to pull as far away from Shiro as he could and call the other Paladins over.

"Ok, listen," Keith hissed. "I don't know how you found out, but you've got to stop teasing. It's making us uncomfortable."

The other three blinked. "Sorry dude," Hunk replied. "We thought it was like, common knowledge by now that you were pining. We just wanted to help."

"Thanks, I guess. But please stop. Shiro doesn't know about it, and I don't want him to."

Lance's jaw dropped. "Wait, what?? He doesn't know?? How could he not know?? You two have been sharing beds and literally _showering_ together, I thought that—you know, _stuff_ would have happened by now."

Keith forced himself not to blush again. "We don't shower togeth—No, okay? Nothing has happened. Shiro doesn't think of me that way. He sees me like a little brother, and I don't want to ruin that. So stop it."

Now they just looked extra confused.

"O-okay, Keith, we'll stop," Pidge said. "But you should know that he actually likes you back."

"No, he doesn't. Just drop it already."

"But he does!" Pidge insisted. "He looks at you the same way you look at him. And he gets this _look_ in his eyes whenever he talks about your when you're not around."

"Yeah, he's been acting different around you lately," Hunk added. "Like he suddenly saw the light recently and realized how he feels."

"Even I've noticed it," said Lance. "And I never notice anything."

Keith didn't dare to let himself hope. He shook his head. "No. Just. Drop it."

As soon as he finished speaking, he felt Shiro draw closer and gave the others a look.

"Hey," Shiro said with a smile. "What are you guys talking about?"

"Nothing," Keith replied quickly. "Just...Lion strategies."

"Yeah, Lion strategies," said Hunk.

Shiro nodded. "Good. You should share your ideas with Allura later. We should go wash up for now, though."

The other three nodded and headed away quietly. Shiro gently tugged Keith along after him.

They were quiet on the way to their rooms. Shiro looked thoughtful. Then he spoke up. "Hey. So. Uh, Coran and Allura were discussing finding a new pilot for the Red Lion."

Keith whirled around to face him. "What? Why? I'm right here!"

"Yeah, but—you're stuck with me. And if we aren't able to break this by now, who knows if we will by the time we need Voltron again."

Keith was quiet for a moment, thinking this over. "Well...who would it be? Red is awfully picky."

"I don't know. We haven't really gotten that far yet."

Keith nodded. Shiro made it to the door of his room and opened it for them to enter. Once they were inside, Shiro started to take off his armor, but Keith hesitated.

"Shiro..."

"Yeah?"

"I--I'm sorry."

Shiro looked at him, confused. "For what?"

"For--this. I don't know, I feel like this is my fault somehow. I-I ran into before we got stuck, and--I mean, I was worried about you, I thought you might get hurt, but--I just--"

Shiro's expression had changed into a soft smile, and he gently put his free hand on Keith's shoulder to stop his rambling. "Hey, hey, Keith," he said soothingly. "You don't have to apologize. This isn't your fault." He shrugged. "Besides, I get to pilot Black with you by my side. I'd hardly call that a bad thing."

Keith felt warm inside at the words. A smile formed on his face as he stared up at his best friend. "Thanks, Shiro," he replied quietly. "And just so you know, if I have to be stuck to someone for possibly the rest of my life...there's no one I'd rather be with than you."

This seemed to surprise Shiro. The look in his eyes went from stunned, to understanding, to something so much deeper and warmer than Keith could recognize.

And then Shiro was kissing him.

For a second Keith had no idea what was happening. He'd barely managed to register the feeling of Shiro's lips on his own, before Shiro was already pulling away and apologizing profusely.

"Shit--Keith, I-I'm so sorry, I didn't mean--I-I don't know what came over me just now, I--"

Keith didn't even think. All he knew was that his inhibitions were suddenly gone, and he just had to feel that again. He surged forward and silenced Shiro with a kiss of his own, awkward and messy but still just as fiery and passionate as everything he did.

Shiro froze for a second but quickly relaxed. He readjusted the angle of his lips and kissed back sweetly. Keith was already in a state of bliss, sighing contentedly as Shiro pulled him closer and deepened the kiss. He would have marveled at the fact that Shiro actually reciprocated his feelings, but he was too busy melting at the sensation of Shiro's tongue sliding against his, Shiro's arms enveloping him and pulling him closer, Shiro, Shiro, _Shiro--_

All too soon, they had to pull apart for air. Keith's heart was still pounding when he opened his heavy eyelids, to see Shiro staring at him just as intensely with that pink flush on his cheeks.

"I...didn't think you'd actually feel the same," Keith whispered, breathless.

Shiro grinned. "Right back at you. I guess Lance really was onto something after all."

Keith rolled his eyes. "Don't bring up Lance right now."

"Sorry."

Keith smiled again and shook his head, removing his arms from where they were wrapped around Shiro's neck and--wait.

"Shiro, our hands!" Keith took a step back and gaped at his hands--now both free--and held them up for Shiro to see.

Shiro's eyes widened and he also let go of Keith, apparently not having noticed. "We're not stuck anymore!"

"Are you kidding me??" Keith shouted, stomping his foot in frustration. "Right when I admit that I'd like to spend the rest of my life with you, that's when it decides to finally break??"

Shiro just started laughing.

"It's not funny! It's annoying!" Keith threw himself at Shiro as if to tackle him, but just ended up in a hug. "Put it back!"

Shiro tried to stop laughing, but ended up with a bunch of joyful snorts and giggles as he tried to speak. "C-come on Keith, we need to tell the others that we don't need aew pilot."

Keith huffed and pulled back. "I don't want to go talk to the others right now."

Shiro's giggles finally died, but he still had the biggest smile on his face that could only be described as adoring when he tilted Keith's chin back up toward him. "Fine. Later." He leaned in close once more. "We'll talk to them later."


End file.
